I recently bought an AXN from hobbyking after hearing about it from a friend, I then saw bruces videos on building it. Unfortunately I bought the RTF version before watching the AXN video not recommending it, oh well. Anyhow I've succesfully built it but realised that the stock esc uses a deans connector, so I went down to Jaycar to pick up some ATX60 connectors but they only had deans, so I just replaced the connectors on my batteries with deans instead, because I didn't want to wait for a new set of ATX60 connectors to ship from somewhere in china. Today I had my first flight. It was going quite well just practicing straight flying, but then I decided to try and do some cornering (bad mistake) I had an overload and forgot to maintain altitude while turning, so my plane ended a bit to high & I was starting to run out of park space, so I tried to land it by reducing my altitude, only to head straight down and head towards a nose dive, I quickly reacted and barley missed the ground, but with that it head back up again and then did another nose dive and I unsuccessfully tried to avoid the ground but I ended up hitting it. The front split like a banana and almost everything fell out of the cockpit. Anyway a bit later, and a bit of some strong reinforced tape gluing it back together and I think its fixed (phew) Guess it just shows how strong the AXN is.

So couple questions:I had to throw the servo arms a bit away, now there not 90° from the servo meaning ailerons have more throw going one way, is this a problem?The fronts slightly misformed after the crash even after my attemps to fix it, it looks pretty solid though so I think it should be fineSome people have said its necessary to balance the props, do you really think its necessary?Is there things I should be messing with on my dx6i to make flying eaiser?I have a copy of X-Plane is this any good for training using the rc models available? I'd hook it up to my dx6i of course.There are no cracks on the side of the foam it just split in at the front a bit along the seam, so I just re-glued it and put masking tape over, do I need to do a more extensive job (like a hot water treatment or something) or is that sufficient?And finally anyone got some good advice to help a beginner get his wings in the air?

Also: I'm using the spektrum dx6i with the ar6210 & I 've done a basic program of the ESC

The best way to not crash is to find someone local who is experienced and see if they can buddybox you that way they can take the controls from you when they think you will crash, if that's not an option then try flying slow a lot of the time, trim the plane and use approx 30 - 40 % expo, this basically dumbs down the controls near the center of the sticks making your finger movements less on the controls and it makes the plane seam tamer to fly, I learned by gliding a lot then climbing back for a lot of height then gliding again, your best bet is a local airfield on a weekend people in clubs are generally helpful to new flyers

Hot water is great for removing "bruises", use before glueing to restore surfaces to their original condition.When taping over curved surfaces use strips of tape (10mm wide is good), this will reduce weight from ineffective/bunched tape. One of my failings in original repairing was to insist that the repair tape was to mate pefectly when met on the opposite side of the surface, what a mess. Now I just ensure that the tape has maximum surface contact with no bubbles or kinks, if you have seen how a boxers' hands are taped this is the method I use, lots of strips all placed with full surface contact.

Not enough time in the day for all my crazy ideas, I'm not slow, I'm just pacing myself

Ok, so I've flown it a couple more times now and my rough landings have added a lot more ware & tear so I was wondering how I should actually go about applying a hot water treatment? What would users recommend from past experiences of repairing AXNs think? I'm assuming for the hot water treatment I just plunk the AXN in a bucket of boiling water and then it sorts it's self out and the dings go away?? The other problem is one of the stock blue servos has gone unresponsive (Oh noes) when the planes hooked up to the battery and I move the sticks for that servo nothing happens, although the servo makes a whining noise once the battery is connected as if the motors trying to turn the servo arm, I'm betting the gears are stripped. Atm I can't figure out how to remove the damm things, the hot glue seems to be holding them in too much. Anyways after crashing it too much for my liking I decided to get my hands on a RC Flight SIM, so now I have a copy of PhoenixRC. Let me tell you I really don't know how I lived without it. The amount of times I've crashed the virtual planes... And the nice thing about using a simulator is you don't have to play it safe, you can just fly it into the middle of nowhere and then do a couple of loops and land without the worries of damaging anything. I'd highly recommend anyone whose starting out to use a simulator (plus its good for rainy days). And it also helps if you use your main radio with the simulator as you'll get a better feel of how to use it, so when you'll actually flying you'll have a good grasp of what you're doing.

The other thing I wanted to mention was, after being grounded for such a long time I was starting to get LOFIS, but my axn & my skills weren't up for flying it atm although the weather was perfect. Anyway later that day when I was at a JayCar I saw this little interesting truck, it was a flying truck! Normally I don't but those cheap Chinese toys, but this one was on sale and what did I have to lose for $20? Anyway after getting it out of the box and trying to fly it inside my house I realised that the turning circle was just too large so I took the tiny truck outside. Luckily there was no wind, and the thing flew surprisingly well. So if you've got a spare $20 dollars and your main models sitting in the shop head down to a JayCar to pickup a flying truck

Good on you for having a go Bio Okay the hot water treatment, I say hot NOT boiling as in a nosedive into a pot on the stove. I boil my electric kettle then let stand for about 2 minutes then gently AND slowly pour the water over the effected surface. This way you can stop at anytime your see an improvement and you don't have to struggle with weighting down the AXN. Repeat the slow pour until you are satisfied with the results.The EPO will expand and resume its' original shape but the surface can resemble a bad case of acne, just roll the bumps out with a round stick.

The servos that come with the ARF are cheapos, sounds like this one has gone. I ordered a bunch of HK15178 and HK15178B (digital), known as the "orange servos", cheap and reliable I have them in my SkyFun, AXN and 2 450 helis. Not one of them has failed and all have been in numerous crashes.If you are having trouble removing the old ones try a scalpel and slowly cut through the glue whilst pulling on the servo, once you get some movement a butter knife is good for leverage without causing damage.

Not enough time in the day for all my crazy ideas, I'm not slow, I'm just pacing myself

Try (say) a dual rate setting of 75% on the aleron & elevator. This limits the travel & tames it down. Plenty of howto vids on youtube.Also put in some expo. Check the Centre of gravity, make sure the alerons & evlevator are centred before each flight.

I bought one of those trucks as well. Good fun, but I found out they seem to use the same freq so cant have 2 flying at the same time(with another flyer)I just bought a quad off ebay, only $50 US(incl shipping to NZ). The truck will stay in the box now. Quads much more fun.

Thanks, I'm experimenting with the DR & Expo settings on my dx6i now, just need to wait for some replacement parts to come from HK before next flight. I have two of the trucks and found the frequency was a problem too, tried exchanging the smd crystals from the trucks transmitter but ended up deciding it wasn't too good of an idea. Also if you feel as if the little truck is under-powered you can swap the battery out for one with a higher C rating which will give it a nice little boost of power

Just did the hot water treatment, I don't think it did too much, well I couldn't quite tell. I think the problem was I didn't really have dents on the axn so to say, but more along the line of little rips in the foam causing the cockpit to expand and become a bit chubby :/ As a result when I poured hot water onto the foam there was nothing to expand (Atleast I think) But it did give the plane a nice clean

The other thing I was wondering about was on the tail wing (The section that has the elevator on it) Well what happened was by some random chance when I crashed on one occasion I tore the left tip off the elevator piece, so I glued + taped it back on, then (what are the chances) I crashed again (on other occasion) and tore a chunk of the right tip off in the exactly same place :/ So my question is by just cutting both side to be straight will that affect the aerodynamics?